Abstract
This exploratory paper conceptualizes, develops, and assesses a potential longitudinal indicator of children’s contexts. Three sets of activities are used to create and examine a cumulative, longitudinal measure of turbulence that aggregates children’s experiences with different types of change. The initial step involves conceptualizing a construct based on theory and previous research and distinguishing it from related or similar constructs. A second set of activities involves defining and coding a measure of the construct. A third step involves examining predictive or concurrent validity. Turbulence encompasses varied types of change experienced by a developing child, for example, repeated changes in child care arrangements, family structure, income, residence and schooling. Each has been separately linked to poorer outcomes for children. For this exploratory work, retrospective data collected in Round 1 of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1997 cohort, were used. A measure was conceptualized and constructed; and the predictive validity of turbulence, over and above background factors, was assessed for a set of adolescent outcomes.
Substantively, we conclude that turbulence is an important and measurable construct, but that better data are needed than currently available. The value of the paper is that it illustrates a general approached for conceptualizing, developing, and examining longitudinal, cumulative indicators.
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Notes
The patterns of associations with adolescent outcomes for the other variables included in the multivariate model were generally in accord with previous research. For example, older teens were more likely to use substances, to have sex, and to associate with negative peers. Males were more likely to engage in delinquency than females; however, they were less likely to report using substances or having negative peers. Gender was unrelated to the quality of the mother-adolescent relationship. Black adolescents were more likely to have sex and negative peers than white adolescents, but less likely to use substances or engage in delinquency. Hispanic adolescents were less likely to use substances than white adolescents. Parent education was not related to the mother-child relationship; but lower parental education was related to higher levels of risks on all of the other variables. Poverty, on the other hand, was not related to delinquency and substance use; but was related to a poorer mother-adolescent relationship, more negative peers, and a greater probability of early sex, net of control variables.
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This paper was funded by the NICHD Family and Child Well-being Research Network under Grant# HD030930.
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Moore, K.A., Vandivere, S., Kinukawa, A. et al. Creating a Longitudinal Indicator: an Exploratory Analysis of Turbulence. Child Ind Res 2, 5–32 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12187-008-9023-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12187-008-9023-5